12 years on, SCO yields fruitful results

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang is scheduled to attend a Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) meeting in Tashkent on Friday, which observers said will inject fresh impetus to regional stability and economic development. [Special coverage]

At the 12th prime ministers' meeting of the SCO member states, Li is expected to sign a raft of cooperation deals to further implement the consensus on practical cooperation reached at an SCO summit in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek earlier this year.

Among those will be an agreement on opening road transportation between Asia and Europe, which would create conditions for an Eurasian transport corridor between Lianyungang in eastern China and St. Petersburg in Russia.

Over the past 12 years, the SCO has become a strategic pillar for the region to maintain security and develop the economy as a whole, yielding fruitful results in various respects.

EFFECTIVE, CLOSE COOPERATION ON SECURITY

Days after the Oct. 28 terrorist attack in Tian'anmen Square which killed five people and injured another 40, senior Chinese official Meng Jianzhu briefed the SCO's Executive Committee of the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS) based in Tashkent on the incident.

In response, the executive committee's director Zhang Xinfeng condemned the attack, saying RATS would fully support a thorough investigation into the case as well as communication among all related parties via the SCO anti-terrorism cooperation mechanism.

Security cooperation, a key task of the SCO since its establishment in Shanghai in 2001, will remain the bloc's top priority and primary objective for quite some time in the future.

The SCO has also initiated a new security concept that is based on mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality and cooperation.

A comparatively complete anti-terror legal system had been established after SCO members signed a series of papers on fighting extremism, terrorism and separatism.

The first SCO summit in 2001 adopted a treaty on cracking down on terrorism, separatism and extremism. It proved to be a far-sighted move in response to the realities of the counterterrorism situation in the region, as some Western countries seem not fully aware of the danger posed by the "three evil forces" and some even attempted to make use of the "three evil forces" for their own political interests.

The SCO has two permanent organs: the Secretariat in Beijing and RATS in Tashkent.

RATS had staged joint anti-terror exercises annually, provided security cooperation for large-scale events, convened information exchange meetings and meetings of border departments in line with changes in regional anti-terror situation.

Taking the 2008 Beijing Olympics as an example, Zhang said RATS has coordinated the measures taken by various SCO security agencies to create a secure environment for the global sports event.